If Marinette finds out first
by literal.semicolon
Summary: It was meant to be a one-shot like "If Adrien finds out first," but it came out in way more detail than I expected. I ended up splitting it in two parts. (Added a bonus confused-Alya chapter, because why not?)
1. Chapter 1

**This turned out a lot longer than I meant it to...**

* * *

Oh, no.

Oh, _god_ , no.

Not him. _Anyone_ but him.

That was the first thing that ran through her mind as she stood in shock over his unconscious body.

"Don't just stand there, Ladybug!" The little black kwami dragged her out of her state of shock. "You need to get him to safety, quickly!"

He was right, of course. The akuma was intent on _literally_ drowning Paris in her tears (which were falling from the sky as rain), and the Seine had already risen enough to move cars. Chat had taken a tree branch to the head while in pursuit.

She pushed her worry to the back of her mind; there'd be time to fret later. Right now, it was time to work.

* * *

As soon as she got home, Marinette was all nerves. She couldn't even speak for ten minutes. She just sat in her bed, hugging her pillow as though it could soften the ache of anxiety in her belly.

"What am I going to do?" she finally whispered.

Tikki knew the question wasn't for her. Marinette needed a listening ear, not advice.

"I can't tell him about my feelings. That could make working together awkward. I can't tell him who I am, because that could make _school_ awkward." She huffed. "But ignoring the fact that I know who he is would raise it to a whole different level of awkwardness."

With a groan, Marinette rolled out of bed and walked over to her desk. She had to make a list of options.

1) Tell Chat (Adrien?) who I am.  
2) Tell him I like him. (That was a definite _no_.)  
3) Ignore that it had ever happened. (It _had_ happened and it was going to affect both of them.)  
4)

She tapped her chin with the pencil. There _had_ to be something less confrontational than just _telling_ him. She didn't exactly have the best track record when it came to talking with Adrien.

Maybe...

4) Let Chat ask me questions?

It was probably the easiest way for her to reveal herself without trying to tell him outright and then chickening out. She wasn't worried about his feelings for her. At least she knew they could be friends and get along. She was more concerned that she wouldn't be able to do her job as Ladybug as well as she had when Chat Noir was just a flirtatious stranger.

A thought.

Adrien doesn't flirt.

So why did he flirt so much as Chat?

"Oooooh, my god," she muttered. "He's been totally serious this whole time. He's had a thing for Ladybu-for _me_ this whole time, and I thought he was just goofing around!" She turned to her kwami. "This is it, Tikki. This is how I die."

Tikki grinned. "You'll be _fine_ , Marinette."

"No," Marinette replied, burying her face in her arms. "Embarrassment and shame will be the death of me."

"It's just Adrien," Tikki replied. "He wouldn't judge you."

"You don't know that, Tikki." Marinette sighed. "He might get embarrassed about my stupid crush on his stupid face." Another thought occurred to her. "Or he'll laugh. It'll be _so much worse_ if he laughs."

Tikki landed on her list, pointing to the last item. "This," she said, "is a good idea. And since you know who he is now, you can leave him a note to meet up with you when you feel ready."

"That's the problem," Marinette whined, dropping her head into her arms again. "I don't think I'll _ever_ be ready."

Tikki smiled and put a tiny hand on Marinette's arm. "Then now is as good a time as any."


	2. Chapter 2

Half an hour after Chat had taken a blow to the head, the streets of Paris were dry, and Adrien had woken up alone on a park bench.

 _Oh no_ , he thought as realization dawned, _Ladybug knows_.

Plagg poked his head out of Adrien's shirt pocket. "Ladybug says she's sorry about ditching you here."

"Plagg!" Adrien could barely contain his excitement. "You were there! Did you talk to her? How did she react when she saw me?"

"Cheese," the kwami replied.

"What?"

"Cheese, then talk." He held out his tiny black paws.

Adrien grumbled, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small plastic container. "I only have a bit of brie. It was all I could find on short notice."

Plagg eyed it for a moment before accepting the offering. "It'll do." He popped the morsel into his mouth before he continued. "I only talked to her long enough to save your butt. And she seemed shocked more than anything."

After considering it, Adrien decided that shock was definitely better than disappointment.

* * *

That evening, it was Adrien's turn to be shocked.

He'd heard a tapping noise at the window, but considering how high off the ground his windows were, he assumed it was a bug or a bird... until it happened again, but louder. He glanced up from his homework to see... Ladybug? Dangling in his window?

She waved at him with a nervous grin and motioned for him to open the window.

He scrambled to let her in. "Sorry, I didn't think you'd-I mean, not today, anyway."

"I-it's fine," she replied, nimbly dropping to his bedroom floor. "My arm was getting tired is all."

Awkward silence reigned for about twenty year-long seconds.

"S-sorry for coming over on such short notice," Ladybug said, clasping her hands behind her back. "Um... would you mind transforming and meeting up with me a few roofs down? I'll give you a few minutes in case your kwami needs to eat something."

She didn't give Adrien a chance to reply before she swung out of his window and made her way to a roof that was clearly visible from his room.

Marinette wasn't quite sure how Tikki had managed to convince her to confront Adrien so soon, but it had to be done, and there was no turning back now.

Chat Noir caught up to her pretty quickly-considering the dazed state Adrien had been in when she'd left. "What do you need, M-Milady?" He was nervous now. Her request to meet up felt very much like a foreboding we-need-to-talk text message.

Ladybug sat down and invited him to sit beside her. Then she took a deep breath. "Ask me anything." She scrambled to add, "Anything except, 'Who are you'."

A short pause.

"Do you know me?" he asked. "I mean, not just as Chat Noir, or as a model in a magazine, but... do you _know_ me?"

She nodded, a small smile flickering across her face.

"Are you... disappointed? About who I am, I mean." He wrapped his arms around his knees, bracing himself for the answer.

Marinette wasn't sure how to feel about it. "Um... this might sound weird, but I had kind of hoped you'd be a total stranger."

Chat's eyebrows knit together, and Ladybug rushed to continue, putting a hand on his arm.

"Not that I don't like you! It's just... it would have been easier for us to keep our identities secret from each other if we had been total strangers."

Chat nodded, satisfied, and returned to vague questions surrounding her identity. "How long have we known each other?" he asked.

Ladybug knew where he was going, but didn't stop him. Him finding out her identity in a roundabout way was basically the point of this game of "Twenty Questions." She answered honestly. "Since the beginning of the school year."

He leaned away from her, surprised. "You go to my school?"

She nodded.

He leaned toward her now, studying her face. "Are you in my class?"

She hesitated but smiled shyly. "Yeah."

Chat Noir began to list off the girls in his class, and she just let him work it out. "You're not Chloe, because she was Antibug. You can't be Sabrina, because she was akumatized before Chloe was. You're not Alya because she was Lady Wifi. You're not Rose, Juleka, or Alix... and you can't be Mylene, so..." He put a hand to his mouth, emerald eyes wide.

Ladybug waited.

"You're... not a _guy_ , are you?" he asked, a smirk giving his joke away.

She punched him in the shoulder. " _Please_ be serious, Chat," she said.

"...Mme. Bustier?" he tried, finally earning a laugh.

"Come _on_ ," Ladybug replied, still grinning.

"Fine, Marinette, but you can't blame me for getting a little confused. You were being pretty vague." He poked her arm. "Also I have one more question."

Ladybug shrugged, considering the hard part was already over. "Shoot."

"Why are you so weird around me at school?"

She froze, her face starting to blend in with her mask. She had been sorely mistaken. The hard part had only begun. "P-pardon?" she said, hoping she'd heard wrong.

"You know," he said, stretching his legs out in front of him and leaning back a little. "You act totally normal and cool around everyone at school except me. I just want to know... Why?"

Nope, she'd definitely heard correctly. She drew her knees to her chest. "W-well, I kind of find you... intimidating."

He laughed. "What, 'cause I'm a model?"

She shook her head, blushing harder. "It's stupid."

"I'm sure it's not," Chat replied, sitting up to put a hand on her shoulder. "You know what? You don't have to answer. I'm happy just knowing who my Lady is."

He stood up to leave, but Marinette had made up her mind to answer _every question_ he asked that night. She grabbed his wrist. "Wait. I want to tell you. Just give me a minute."

He allowed her to pull him back down beside her. "Alright, I'll wait."

She had to give herself a silent pep talk, but she finally found the words, quiet as they were. "I... well, I kinda... have a crush on you."

Chat was, well... surprised, to say the least. "You... what?" he asked in a similarly hushed tone.

Ladybug covered her flushed face with her hands. "I said I like your stupid face, okay?" It came out louder than she'd meant it to.

He let out a triumphant laugh as he tackled her with a hug. "That's what I thought you'd said, Bugaboo."

* * *

 **I apologize for being terrible at endings. I hope you liked it anyway. :3**


	3. BONUS: The next school day

Alya thought she was dreaming at first, but when she saw a couple of other students stiffen, she knew it wasn't. No one else noticed the weird stuff in her dreams. She wanted to ask everyone if what she was seeing was real, but Marinette and Adrien had made their way to their seats too quickly.

"Um, Marinette?" she whispered.

"Mm?" Marinette pulled out her books.

Alya waited for Mme. Bustier to turn to the board before continuing. "Was I just hallucinating just now, or did you and Adrien just walk into class together?"

Marinette blushed a little. "Oh, yeah. We kind of got trapped together during the last akuma attack, so we ended up talking till it all got cleared up."

Alya leaned a little closer. "So?"

Marinette knew what she meant, but chose to play dumb. "'So' what?"

"Girl, you _know_ what." She raised an eyebrow.

Marinette's eyes flicked to the back of Adrien's head. "Can this wait till later?"

Alya narrowed her eyes with a smirk, but nodded, turning her attention to the lesson.

* * *

Alya went home with Marinette and followed her up to her room, barely letting the trap door shut before pouncing on her. "Ok, spill!"

Marinette paused. Then she flipped her backpack over, the contents dropping to the floor and startling her friend. Then she laughed as she sat down on her chaise, leaving her books where they were. "Sorry," she said with a grin. "You said, 'spill,' and Adrien's jokes are rubbing off on me."

"Jokes?" Alya didn't think he was much of a joker.

"Yeah," Marinette said as her friend sat cross-legged beside her. "I didn't realize what a goofball he was until he said something about the akuma 'raining on his parade.'"

Alya laughed. "Oh my goodness, that's so lame!"

"Lame, but still funny," Marinette said. "Of course, it was funnier after the akuma had been neutralized."

"So," Alya said, not even bothering to segue. "What did you talk about? Did you ask him out?"

Marinette's face warmed, and she fidgeted with her hands. "Well, no, but he knows I like him now."

Alya playfully punched her shoulder. "Wow, girl, you finally did it! I'm so proud of you! What did he say?"

Marinette coughed uncomfortably. "Well, he hugged me…"

"That's good," Alya replied.

She turned away from Alya, muttering, "…and he said, 'I like your stupid face, too.'"

Alya laughed long and loud, and she wiped away tears, squeezing her words out between guffaws. "You said… Oh, god… _my abs!_ …Haha! You said… 'I like your… your _stupid face'?_ "

Marinette nodded, blushing a deep red.

"Oh, Marinette!"

A few minutes later, when Alya's laughter had died down to giggles, she said, "So what now? Are you two going to date, or what?"

Marinette shrugged. "For now, we're just friends, but at least now I can talk to him without worrying what he thinks."

"And maybe _he'll_ ask _you_ out sometime," Alya replied, nudging her friend.

"Oh, that reminds me," Marinette replied, "I was thinking that we could double—Adrien and I, and you and Nino."

Alya stiffened. " _He-e-ell_ , no."

Marinette frowned, confused. "I thought you two were, I dunno, a thing."

Her friend laughed. "Maybe one day, but right now, he's too into himself."

Marinette smiled. _That kind of reminds me of a certain cat_ , she thought. _Except he's usually joking… I hope_.

* * *

 **So... that's probably the end of this one. I'm terrible at endings. I apologize.**

 **Now I just have to convince one of my sisters to watch ML too... Well, when she's not watching Shippuden.**


End file.
